﻿194 H. S. Williams — Lamellibranchiata and Species-making. 



locality, before the text was even in the hands of the printers, 

 reference being made to plates, but no mention of the fact that 

 they were manuscript names. 



This action aroused serious criticism, although little was 

 made public. And, although the author doubtless expected to 

 get the volume out very soon, it was not till 1883 that paleon- 

 tologists received the plates. So much impatience was evident 

 that the author, being unable to persuade the Legislature to 

 publish the volume, bought a hundred sets of the plates and 

 distributed them in 1883 to the chief institutions and workers 

 interested in the subject in this country. With the plates were 

 given printed explanations of plates, and the announcement 

 was made that the text was ready and in the hands of the 

 printer. 



Much confusion and annoyance has arisen from this prelim- 

 inary distribution of plates, and 'publication of names so long 

 (at least seven years) before the regular publication of the text 

 and plates. But, aside from this, impatience naturally becomes 

 extreme when we look at the prodigious amount of alteration 

 which has been made in the identification, both specific and 

 generic, in the plates illustrating the fossils supposed to be 

 representative types. Comparison of the plates and explana- 

 tions issued in 1883 with the text and plates issued in 1885, — 

 the plates being the same with a few additions in the latter, 

 — reveals the following facts. 



In the first set of statistics, I have compared only those 

 species and genera both of which, in both works, were already 

 fully described when the first work was issued in 1883. The 

 changes made in identification of the figures, representing 284 

 species and 47 genera (the plates being identically the same) 

 were 81 in number as regards the genera, and 128 as regards 

 the species. 



If now we consider the figures which were referred in 1883 

 to old species, and in 1885 to new species, we find 96 cases, 

 and of figures placed in old genera in the first case and changed 

 to new genera in 1885, we find 117 cases. 



Looked at from another point of view, and eliminating from 

 the problem all matter added in 1885 and all specific and gen- 

 eric names not fully described and used before the first publica- 

 tion, 1883, there were made 209 changes of identification for 

 205 species under consideration. 



If we take the plates published in the Report of the State 

 Geologist to the Legislature for 1882, printed in 1884, and 

 compare the identification of the figures, which are there repro- 

 ductions of those in the text and plates of 1885, a similar set 

 of discrepancies appears. 



This Report was issued, professedly, as an official illustration 



